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Eric Weinstein states that peer review was not used in science before 1965. It was created by doctors trying to bypass government oversight after the Medicare Act, then weaponized by fiscal conservatives in 1975 to target the National Science Foundation.
Michael Kratsios explains that the Office of Science and Technology Policy, established in the 1960s, coordinates the decentralized US research apparatus. The US deliberately lacks a single centralized science agency, dispersing R&D across several independent departments.
A Senate committee analysis led by Senator Ted Cruz revealed that approximately 25% of National Science Foundation grants during the Biden administration funded DEI-related initiatives. Michael Kratsios claims this redirected $8 billion over four years away from core science.
To foster breakthrough R&D, the Trump administration is establishing meta-science units at the NSF and NIH. These units will pilot golden tickets allowing individual evaluators to unilaterally fund high-risk, high-reward proposals.
The National Science Foundation is testing flexible grant durations to break the default 18-month academic cycle. New pilots will offer fast-track six-month grants for short ideas alongside longer-dated five-year grants.
Science received European marketing approval for the Prima retinal prosthesis, an implant that restores form vision by projecting laser images. Science acquired the underlying technology from French developer Pixium in late 2022.
Age-related macular degeneration represents a massive addressable market for Science. The disease affects one in two people with early-stage symptoms by age 80, and one in ten people by age 85.
Science manages a three-part development pipeline focused on working vision, bio-hybrid neural interfaces that graft living neurons, and a perfusion medicine program. Max Hodak expects these programs to mature over ten to fifteen years.
Max Hodak structured Science as a technology company rather than a traditional East Coast biotech firm, raising capital primarily from tech venture capital. Bob Nelson was the only biotechnology investor pitched during the Series A round.
David Brooks warns that relying on AI to bypass mental effort risks degrading critical thinking skills. MIT Media Lab and Possibility Sciences research both show marked declines in brain connectivity and gamma wave activity when individuals utilize AI for tasks.
Jim Otvos founded Liposcience to commercialize NMR technology, developing the automated Vanta analyzer which received FDA clearance in 2011. LabCorp acquired Liposcience in 2014 for financial reasons, subsequently halting the distribution of Vanta machines to other laboratories.
Science Corporation's Prima device, an ocular BCI, received CE mark approval in Europe for restoring detailed vision in patients with age-related macular degeneration, achieving five lines of vision improvement in trials.
Six companies are pursuing partial epigenetic reprogramming, including Life Biosciences (a Peter Diamandis portfolio company), which is dosing humans with a virus carrying Yamanaka factors to treat glaucoma and optic nerve damage. This therapy aims to reset cell age by adjusting gene expression.
Brooks references MIT Media Lab and Possibility Sciences research linking AI use to cognitive decline; brain connectivity fell 55% and gamma wave activity dropped 40%.